SAN LEANDRO — The City Council has rejected a cap on contributions to council election campaigns.

However, starting next year, San Leandro will be subject to a statewide $4,700 limit on campaign contributions that covers cities and counties that have not set a cap.

That limit matches what people can give to candidates running for Assembly or state Senate.

City Councilman Victor Aguilar Jr. had proposed a much lower limit for San Leandro: $500 over a two-year election cycle.

On Monday, the rest of the council said no and voted to drop the idea of a local ordinance entirely.

“They are toothless,” Councilman Pete Ballew said about rules setting contribution caps. “Even if you can enforce them, there are too many ways around it.”

Supporters can contribute the maximum amount to a candidate, Ballew said, then provide money to friends or family members to make additional contributions, ostensibly in their own names.

Anyone who would take such action, however, would be breaking the law.

“This is something that you can’t really track,” Councilman Benny Lee said about wrong-doers, adding that he believed checking for violations would take up too much of a city employee’s work time during election season.

Lee was a big fundraiser during his bid to become mayor in November 2018, raising more than $75,000 early on in his campaign.

On Monday, he noted many of his contributors were Asian Americans who lived outside San Leandro. But he said he could not think of anyone who leveraged their contribution to push city policy.

“Race equity was part of the equation,” Lee said.

The California Fair Political Practices Commission, which promotes integrity in state and local government, already enforces campaign finance laws, he said.

“I don’t think this should be the job of our city clerk,” he said.

But Aguilar said a local cap would prevent developers with deep pockets and a financial stake in local politics from having too much influence.

“We need campaign contribution limits in order to level the playing field,” he said.

Former mayoral candidate Jeromey Shafer agreed.

“Money in politics is an issue,” Shafer told the council. “It’s an issue nationally, and it does affect us here locally, too.”

Aguilar cast the lone vote against Ballew’s motion to kill the proposal.

Some nearby cities already have limits in place.

Berkeley has a mandatory contribution limit of $250 per person, entity or corporation, while in Dublin it’s also mandatory and set at $500. The mandatory limit in Oakland is $100, and in Union City it’s $720. Fremont’s mandatory limit is $640.

Hayward has a voluntary campaign expenditure limit for candidates adjusted annually for inflation. Last year, it was $75,895. Candidates who accept the limit were allowed to accept individual contributions of $1,488. Candidates who did not accept the limit could not receive donations of more than $352 in 2019.

San Leandro City Clerk Leticia Miguel said in a report for the council that someone in her office could spend up to an hour each day reviewing a candidate’s campaign filings as part of enforcing an ordinance.

Asking the nonpartisan Fair Political Practices Commission for help also can be expensive, Miguel said.

The commission bills each city on an hourly basis for work, and requires a minimum payment of $55,000 regardless of the number of hours worked, with the bill capped annually at $100,000.

City officials had been considering a possible ordinance since April last year, when the council’s rules committee began discussing whether one should be crafted, the possible limit amount and whether compliance should be voluntary or mandatory.

Assembly Speaker Pro Tempore Kevin Mullin of South San Francisco authored the state bill that established local campaign contribution limits. It will take effect Jan. 1, 2021.

Jurisdictions adopting their own contribution limits, whether higher or lower, will not be subject to the $4,700 default limit set under the legislation. The new rules only apply to candidates seeking city and county offices.

“Keeping big money out of local elections is a win for representative democracy and the people of California,” Dora Rose, deputy director of the League of Women Voters of California, said in a release after Newsom signed the law. ”Setting a reasonable contribution limit, that could be changed up or down by local voters, puts the interests of ordinary Californians ahead of the donor class.”

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